Chapter 49 #2
I saw Kevin Sherry. And he – the boy who never wanted to set eyes on me again – saw me.
Almost a year ago, when he’d looked at me through that front windscreen of the hearse, he’d given me a look that I didn’t understand at the time; it took me a whole year to work it out.
Maybe it took Kevin the whole year too. He was crying now.
Crying so much it looked like he might never stop.
He turned his head into Leanne’s shoulder as they scrolled out of sight.
Mr Feeney kept the distance and I kept the pace.
Matty was mainly quiet but said a few words of support every now and again.
‘Keep ’er steady, that’s it.’ Or, ‘Slow her up a wee tad.’
When we approached the gates of St Matthew’s I saw Jennifer with her mum and dad.
Her eyes went wide when she saw me driving.
I felt like I hadn’t seen her in months even though it had only been a few days ago at the hospital.
She’d been waiting in the corridor outside the room that Ronan had left us in.
She had stood up, saw my face, and knew.
As she held me I saw, over her shoulder, my birthday cake sitting on the plastic chairs, all sliced up.
And, in a pile beside it, all the spent candles.
I drove through the gates and brought the hearse to a stop outside the doors of St Matthew’s where the priest was standing.
I turned the engine off. Matty, wordless for possibly the first time in his life, simply put a hand on my shoulder before he stepped out.
Mr Feeney, out in front, turned and gave me a tiny nod.
But before I got out I turned to Ronan behind me.
‘How was it?’ I said.
‘Not bad,’ he would have said. ‘Bit slow.’
‘And steady,’ I said.
‘Wins the race,’ he’d say.
‘Won,’ I said. ‘Won the race.’
I put my hand on the coffin; it was just him and me for a moment, silent.
I took my hand away, opened the door and stepped out.
‘Expertly done, Brendan,’ said Mr Feeney, quietly coming up beside me, ‘expertly done.’
I looked behind and it was only then I realised that all the people who had been lining the pavements had joined the procession.
It looked like an audience of hundreds to my eyes compared to the small group that had started at the funeral home.
I’d been so locked into my journey forward that I hadn’t properly looked back.
In the crowd of faces it was Mr and Mrs McCoys’ that shone out the strongest.
‘Brendan, oh my goodness, that was just so, oh my goodness, just so special,’ said Mrs McCoy, coming up to me.
‘Brendan, son, it really was,’ said Mr McCoy. ‘We didn’t expect that, you made that whole journey so much easier knowing it was you leading the way.’
‘It was, honestly, the greatest honour,’ I said.
I knew I wouldn’t have been able to speak during the service that was to follow. I hadn’t even been sure if I could manage the drive, but I had done it and I hoped Ronan would be proud of me.
Ronan was carried on the shoulders of the pallbearers into the church.
I followed with Mr and Mrs McCoy as everyone filed in behind and began filling up the pews.
We sat together at the front. During the service family members did Bible readings and prayers of the faithful and we listened as the priest spoke about Ronan, too numb to take anything in.
When the service ended Mr Feeney became the conductor once again, the final stage of his duties.
He summoned the pallbearers, Mr McCoy joined this time, and once more Ronan was raised up onto their shoulders and carried down the aisle.
I followed behind. I was thinking about the picture I’d put in with Ronan, that black-and-white captured moment of him held high.
When I looked up at the coffin I could only see Ronan as he was that day back when the picture was taken; held high, like the world was his own, at the height of happiness.
Looking up, it was as if I could hear the crowds of cheering students all around him, celebrating him.
It was as if the tears in my eyes were tears of happiness and love and gratitude for the friendship we had.
I could see him crystal clear looking down at me; smiling, laughing, crying.
I really could see him, as if he was up there, closing his eyes, turning round on top of the dark blur of people below and laying down flat across them.
They stopped.
We were at the graveside.
Mr Feeney called me forward as Ronan’s coffin was laid on top of wooden slats across the mouth of the grave.
He led me to the coffin side and put a length of cord in my hand.
There were others around the grave too; Mr and Mrs McCoy opposite me, all holding a length of cord.
The slats were removed and the weight of Ronan was in our hands.
We lowered him down until the cords went loose. He had come to rest.
There were words said, prayers, blessings, but my eyes never left the open grave.
‘Grief,’ Mr Feeney always said, ‘is a strange thing. No two people ever feel it the same way and no two people ever feel the same afterwards.’
I lifted a handful of earth, held it over the grave and let go.